Student suggestions wanted, task force says

In the second meeting since its creation last year, the Task Force on Extending Shared Governance met in Old Main yesterday to hear the concerns of student and faculty representatives.

"We want to add to shared governance the voices of students, classified staff and appointed personnel of all kinds. This task force is mandated to come up with plans to do that," said Jerry Hogle, faculty chair and task force chairman.

The realization spurred the development of the committee whose purpose is to bring more university groups into the policy-making process.

Some issues discussed included:

• Continued undergraduate student representation on strategic planning, budget and search committees

• The roles of student voices on campus other than the Associated Students (including student associations and the Graduate and Professional Student Council)

• Status of the Arizona International Campus of the UA.

Yesterday's meeting yielded no conclusions, but all concerns discussed will be compiled to be presented to UA President Peter Likins in hopes of giving more power to faculty and students in university policy-making.

Shared governance potentially gives faculty a hand in such issues as salary and program elimination. The original memorandum, however, provided for collaboration between administration and faculty only.

After review, the committee realized that the focus needed to be expanded to students too, Hogle said.

"We began to realize that people were left out," he said.

Charlie Hurt, a Faculty Senate representative on the task force said people at all levels of the university need to realize they have a stake in policy-making and planning.

"This philosophy needs to be more pervasive," he said.

The task force, which was formed in September 1996 by the Shared Governance Memorandum, which was passed by the Faculty Senate also discussed ways of publicizing their readiness to hear suggestions from all sectors of the campus community.

Sociology graduate student Lisa Rashotte represented the GPSC at the meeting.

She felt student representation on the task force was a critical step in ensuring student representation in policy-making.

"We're trying to ensure that students have input on issues that are going to affect students," she said.

The task force hopes to have their recommendations to Likins in January.

"This is the time to do all this, when we have a new president who is willing to listen," Hogle said.

They will present their recommendations before the Faculty Senate for a vote after the meeting with Likins.

If passed, the recommendations may be used to amend the Faculty Senate's constitution, Hogle said.

But until then, the task force is soliciting student input.

"We want to get the word out to the campus community about what we're doing so that everyone has a choice to have input," Rashotte said.

Suggestions may be sent via e-mail to Hogle at hogle@ccit.arizona.edu.